April 2009

April 30, 2009

The Film Society of Lincoln Center has had some year of changes: the renovation of Alice Tully Hall, the hiring of Mara Manus to head, the rechristening of their annual award in the name of Charlie Chaplin, its first recipient. How fitting to honor another screen Everyman, that “regular guy” Tom Hanks. On Monday night, Geoffrey Rush and Jane Krakowski and others made their way through abandoned tables in the refurbished lobby, where ravaged plates of mousse and black and white cookies sat waiting for clean up, evidence of a fine dinner for donors and VIPs, and centerpieces featured that nostalgic thing: snippets of film with sprockets. The tribute consisted of the usual clips and speeches: directors Ron Howard, Jonathan Demme, Mike Nichols, John Patrick Shanley, and Steven Spielberg shed light on Tom Hanks's creative process. Sally Field, his “mother” in Forrest Gump, and Charlize Theron-- Hanks directed her in “That Thing You Do” also weighed in on Hanks's exemplary career. Nora Ephron retold the story of Tom Hanks as if he were born Pinchas Greenblatt and married to his beautiful wife (the real Rita Wilson) Rivka. Julia Roberts arrived onstage claiming to have to pee, and sprinkled her tribute to Hanks with enough expletives to cause him to remark at her astounding “potty mouth.” Speaking of dedication to craft, Jonathan Demme said no one asked Hanks to, but as Andrew, suffering from AIDS in “Philadelphia,” Hanks ate only steamed vegetables and poached chicken for four months. Bruce Springsteen and his wife Patti Scialfa serenaded him with the theme song to “Philadelphia.” And, after a clip of the classic “Chopsticks” tap dance on FAO Schwartz keyboard from “Big,” a rendition on piano was performed. Mary McFadden, Julie Taymor, Christie Brinkley, Bob Balaban, and Jeremy Irons were among the guests as Hanks himself took the stage, and asked, “Where do you go after Lincoln Center?” Well, you don't leave. You stay for an after party of sweets.

April 27, 2009

Aidan Quinn turned up again on Saturday night joining the cast and crew of “Handsome Harry,” a new film directed by Bette Gordon premiering at the Tribeca Film Festival. This time the veteran indie director-her classic 1984 film “Variety” with screenplay by Kathy Acker will also be screened-- turned her gaze on a group of men who had served together in the navy during the Vietnam era. Now thirty years later, the title character, an excellent Jamey Sheridan, known mostly for his work on television, is obliged to fulfill Tom Kelley's (a fine Steve Buscemi) deathbed wish for atonement bringing back the violent events of a cataclysmic night. The story of love, betrayal, and homophobia also features Campbell Scott and Bill Sage. You couldn't find a more handsome group fielding questions from the enthusiastic crowd. Observing the line up, Gordon said she was trying to cast her William Holdens, Lee Marvins, and Ben Gazzaras in this interesting reversal, a female director's take on men. Other movies to look out for in the festival's tasty smorgasbord are “Team Qatar,” a documentary following a teenaged debating team from that Middle East region as they train in Doha, London, New York on their way to Washington D.C. for the world championship; “Easy Virtue,” a period piece based on a Noel Coward play with lots of clever banter from Kristin Scott Thomas and her new daughter-in-law played by the lovely Jennifer Biel. With period soundtrack evoking Cole Porter, who could ask for anything more? (Oops, that's Gershwin!) And on Sunday night, another Tribeca standout was screened at IFC Center: “In the Loop,” starring James Gandolfini will open in July, but the party starts now. Quintessentially co-hosted the festivities at Madam Geneva, a new venue in the Bowery. Jeremy Irons joined director Armando Iannucci munching on Asian influenced hors d'oeuvres and chatting about the joys of moviemaking compared to working on television. This being his first film, the British director of the popular BBC comedy series “The Thick of It,” said, he's now “caught the bug.”

April 25, 2009

Playwright Conor McPherson’s horror film tucked into a love story, “The Eclipse,” had its first screening before an audience on Friday afternoon. The newly refurbished (by Milton Glaser) Visual Arts Theater in Chelsea was packed with admirers of the Irishman’s work, most recently “The Seafarer” on Broadway featuring Ciaran Hinds as a visitor with a suspiciously sulfurous whiff. In “The Eclipse,” part of this year’s Tribeca Film Festival, Hinds plays a widower volunteering at a writers’ conference in his hometown, Cobh, on the Irish coast. As Michael Farr he has visions from the beyond, boxes with a famous and full-of-himself author played by Aidan Quinn, and has a tender romance with a novelist he chauffeurs about town. Haunted by repressed emotions, he is a grown man who cries. McPherson clearly loves the supernatural, deploying blood-dripping ghosts to great effect in this surprisingly shlock-less, deeply satisfying movie. The director and stars were present for a Q & A. Fellow filmmaker/ playwright John Patrick Shanley (he wrote the stage play, movie script and directed the excellent “Doubt”) asked McPherson about this preoccupation. “We’re all part of the universe so why wouldn’t we see ghosts?” was the reply. Others remarked at McPherson’s peaceful way of dealing with death, and with grief. Liam Neeson chatted with the filmmakers as the audience left. Let’s hope he too found solace in viewing this fine film, which as yet has no distribution. Not for long.

Still charmed by this movie’s sweet music mixed with bits of the macabre, I was whisked away east on 23rd Street in a ric-taxi festooned with Delta Airline logo from a company called Bicytaxi, a perk of the Tribeca Festival making me feel, they think of everything. My destination was the Blender Theater in Gramercy Park for Lou Reed’s experimental, heavily electrified, ear-splitting hour-long riff with the young musicians Sarth Calhoun and Ulrich Krieger—and veteran John Zorn. As people filed out, overcome by the noise, others stayed on somehow sated by the vibrations. Warhol acolyte Brigid Berlin was among the latter, as was I. After years of being a big fan, after the 2008 Tribeca Film Festival’s celebration of Julian Schnabel’s concert documentary of Lou Reed’s romantic work called “Berlin,” I remain awed by this artist’s riskier side.

April 15, 2009

In the powder room of the Zeigfeld just before the opening night screening of the new HBO movie of the original Maysles Brothers documentary, “Grey Gardens,” Drew Barrymore patted down her blond finger waves snugly held together under a veiled cloche. In a flesh toned beaded gown, she looked radiant and so Hollywood. Jessica Lange, her blond curls tumbling around her face, looked equally glamorous in lavender. Back in the 90's when the Maysles' classic cinema verite was revived downtown at Film Forum, the economy was fine and revelers at the opening night after party acted out the roles of the Edie Beales, mother and daughter, in full Little Edie regalia: head swathed in sweater held together by a single brooch. Hips adorned in fabric held together by safety pins, improvised, and famously fashioned for this now iconic tale of riches to rags. With the new dramatization-superb for the acting, costuming and makeup--to air on April 18, Grey Gardens has come uptown. No one at the posh opening party at the Pierre was done up Edie style. No one, including Stanley Tucci, Steve Buscemi, Jimmy Fallon, Deborah Harry, Ben Bradlee, had that bohemian edge-excepting Albert Maysles. That may be because the narrative has shifted as it did in the musical play, to include the backstory of their lives as rich debutantes related to the Kennedy's through Jacqueline Bouvier (played wonderfully by Jeanne Tripplehorn who also attended, attired in off the shoulder polka dots). The economy has shifted too: it is all too easy to see one self in the not so remote reality of the Edie Beales-- the image of their Grey Gardens as a metaphor of our culture-- embedded a dilapidated, cat feces encrusted mansion, questionably salable, even if it is south of the highway in East Hampton, a testament to former glory.

April 14, 2009

Once upon a time in early '70's New York, a balding redhead turned from making omelets for Sunday brunch to explain to friends that he was writing the words to a song for a diva-ish character who now needing a job was willing to take a place in the chorus line. That man was Edward Kleban, the lyricist of the legendary “A Chorus Line,” a show that went from The Public Theater under Joe Papp's tutelage to hold the record as the longest running musical on Broadway. Along the way it won a Pulitzer, Tonys. Now, after its NY premiere in Lincoln Center's New Directors/New Film series last month, a documentary opening this Friday, “Every Little Step,” will take you behind the scenes of creating the show's 2006 revival on Broadway, and while this gem offers a rare behind the scenes glimpse of the actual audition process, with lots of song and dance including the show's iconic “What I Did for Love,” “One,” etc, Kleban is mentioned only in a murmur by Marvin Hamlisch, the show's composer. Rather, the film focuses on the work of Michael Bennett (1943-1987) who famously recorded an all night rap session where “gypsies” told their stories. Somewhere in there is a play, he said, and, as they say, the rest is history. Directors James D. Stern and Adam Del Deo went back to this marathon audio track, and convincing Actors Equity to allow them unprecedented access to film the auditions, they created a documentary that gives you what no feature could, the film version of the play. On Monday night, Andy McDowell, Nora Ephron, Erica Jong, joined Donna McKechnie (the original Cassie), Baayork Lee (the original Connie who also choreographed the revival), Marvin Hamlisch, SONY Picture Classic's Tom Bernard and Michael Barker, the revival's castmembers and filmmakers for a celebratory screening at the Paris Theater. When asked why no Kleban, Adam Del Deo said they wanted to keep the pacing. As soon as they began to put in the history, Kleban's story, for example-he died in 1987-or Michael Bennett's marriage to Donna McKechnie (Bennett was clearly gay), the movie began to sag. Leaving the Paris, McKechnie noted, “Ed Kleban was always the unsung hero of “A Chorus Line.”

April 07, 2009

If you see a young boy in a movie, chances are the producer David Heyman (Boy With the Stripted Pajamas, Oliver Twist) has something to do with it. His new film, Is Anybody There? features a boy who turns 11, and lives in a house turned retirement home with his parents and a bunch of doddering, drooling and dying biddies, some charming as the one played with such grace by Rosemary Harris whose whole life seems to flash past her face as she fondles her old satin dancing shoes, and others just snippy. Into the mix comes the Amazing Clarence (Sir Michael Caine), an erstwhile magician, showman, and philanderer. He’s going senile, but not before he shows the death-obsessed boy a trick or two—and performs one of those mini guillotine dropping tricks to jaw-dropping effect, making you very grateful that he’s not sawing a woman in two. This is one of those rare movies, touching and funny and wise. At the premiere on Monday night, Michael Caine, his young co-star Bill Milner, the writer Peter Harness and the director John Crowley were feted by Paul Haggis, Stephen Daldry, Bob Balaban, Jean Doumanian, Dick Cavett, Gay and Nan Talese, Nora Ephron, and Nick Pileggi. A dining area of The Oak Room was perfect for the party where beef and French fries were served as well as a magnificent foie gras stuffed pork. Kudos to the filmmakers—and to the chef!

April 04, 2009

Beauty is always skin deep in the plays of Neil LaBute, with cataclysmic consequences for his characters. In ” reasons to be pretty,” at the Lyceum Theater, an offhanded remark by Greg (Thomas Sadoski), a Poe/ Hawthorne reading regular Joe, about his live-in girlfriend Steph's (Marin Ireland) “regular” face sets off a chain of expletives “worthy of an Eddie Murphy movie.” The communicative meltdown is the kind of verbal and physical violence you can also see in “God of Carnage” on Broadway in another play about 2 couples behaving badly. The other couple in this blue collar suburb is married: Carly played by Piper Perabo as a security guard and her philandering husband, Greg's coworker Kent (Steven Pasquale). This play has no pretense of evoking all of Western civilization as “Carnage” attempts to do, and yet, there is no loss to the emotional resonance of a casual slight. La Bute has mined this territory before, in “Fat Girl,” and in the movie “In the Company of Men,” to brutal effect, where girls who are not quite America's top model, or “trophy” worthy are savagely dissed. Localized in an anywhere USA workplace the scenes shift deftly from a shipping factory to a company cafeteria to schoolyard, giving these small town workers a place to voice their locker room concerns with looks, bodies, La Bute's signature preoccupation with these superficialities. Feelings are hurt so bad, the fragile cords in relationships fray. As well directed by Terry Kinney, the action is fast-paced: the playwright's dialogue shines, as Greg and Steph begin to listen, really pay attention to each other. The audience at Thursday night's opening was listening too. Edie Falco, Jean Doumanian, Caroline Rhea, Amber Tamblyn, and Brian DePalma were among those in rapt attention to this tale of broken hearts. Tova Feldshuh (so good as the title character in “Irena's Vow”) and Matt Cavanaugh (a fine Tony in “West Side Story”) arrived at the rooftop party at Hudson Terrace fresh from their own performances. Marin Ireland, resplendent in a gold sequined sheath, looked anything but regular.

April 02, 2009

You would think the revival of “Hair,” the 1967 rock musical, so ecstatic in the open air at The Public Theater’s Delacorte Theater in Central Park last summer could not be contained indoors--like shoehorning back the contents of Pandora’s Box. Think again. At its new venue, the Al Hirschfeld Theater, the characters cavort and cajole their in-your-face performances using the walls as a springboard. As they sing, dance, climb, jump, and play, these hippies have not lost their exuberance for life: on Friday night, the frenetic hottie Berger (Will Swenson) in a leather fringed g-string did his lap sitting routine in the audience with his feet up—as it turned out-- on Joy Behar’s shoulder. This play so epitomizes the art of engagement: cast members hand out daisies, hugs, and flyers for a be-in, and old fart or not, be there or be square. Performances by Bryce Ryness as the Mick Jagger vamping Woof, Theo Stockman as Hubert and Tribe member at large, Kacie Sheik as pregnant Jeanne, and Sasha Allen as Dionne stand out in an altogether stand out cast. Kudos to Michael McDonald for his costuming, Karole Armitage’s choreography, and to the outstanding band featuring Bernard Purdie on drums. Surprisingly, Hair’s central anti-war story is still fresh, especially in the talented hands of director Diane Paulus, with her trademark commitment to breaking down the wall between performer and spectator. When Sheila (the excellent Caissie Levy) who loves both Berger and Claude (a fine Gavin Creel) says she’s been at a demonstration in Washington and everybody was there, mentioning beat poet Allen Ginsberg, she speaks to the go-for-broke candor and nakedness of that time, a vulnerability that makes the Tribe’s Woodstock evoking nakedness on stage at the end of Act 1 so poignant. “Where do I go?” sings Claude and while the draft card-burning ritual does not have the urgency now as it did last summer when the Bush years’ lingering Iraq policy pushed many young people into a seemingly endless war, with the seismic shift to Obama, we still yearn for love, spirit, meaning—with no easy answers.

On opening night, the company spilled into the cavernous Gotham, a converted bank on Herald Square: Tovah Feldshuh, superb in her new play “Irena’s Vow,” Stephen Daldry, Martha Plimpton, Audra McDonald, and Tommy Tune were some of the attendees. Appropriately for this show that launched the jean industry into its decades long wardrobe staple status, sponsor Levi Strauss set up a lounge with “Hair” inscribed pillows and lava lamps. “Hair”’s picture of an edenic world is infectious. May I recommend that when these flower children come round to pull you onstage in the finale. Go. Do it.